above Semna, are the ruins of a temple with Meroitic hiero glyphics. At Soleb, 143 m. above Halfa, are the ruins of a fine temple commemorating Amenophis (Amenhotep) III. (c. B.c.), to whose queen, Taia, was dedicated a temple at Sedeinga, a few miles to the north. At Sesebi, 4o m. higher up the Nile, is a temple of the heretic king, Ikhnaton, re-worked by Seti I. (c.
1327 B.c.). Opposite Hannek, at the Third Cataract on Tombos island, are extensive ancient granite quarries, in one of which lies an unfinished colossus. On the east side of the river, near Kerma, are the remains of an Egyptian city. Argo island, a short distance higher up, abounds in ruins, and from Old Dongola to Merawi (a distance of zoo m. by the river) are numerous ruins of mon asteries, churches and fortresses of the Christian era in Nubia— notably at Jebel Deka and Magal. In the immediate neighbour hood of Jebel Barkal (the "holy mountain" of the ancient Egyp tians), a mile or two above the existing village of Merawi (Merowe), are many pyramids and six temples, the pyramids hav ing a height of from 35 to 6o feet. They mark the site of Napata, the religious capital of ancient Ethiopia, from which spread the worship of Amen. On the left bank of the Nile, opposite Merawi, are the pyramids of Nuri, and a few miles distant, in the Wadi Ghazal, are the ruins of a great Christian monastery, where were found gravestones with inscriptions in Greek and Coptic. Thirty miles north of the town of Shendi are the pyramids of Meroe, in three distinct groups. From one of these pyramids was taken "the treasure of Queen Candace," now in the Berlin museum. Excava tion is busy with this ancient site, and, among a vast number of tombs, shrines and dwellings there stand out the Temple of the Sun (600 B.c.) and the pylon of a great temple to Amen (300 B.c.), the most perfect ruins in the Sudan, associated with the Ethiopian kingdom of Queen Candace. They comprise three tem ple groups, in good preservation, at Nagaa, and a mass of build ings at Mussawarat, belonging to the 2nd or 3rd century A.D. Farther south, Christian remains are to be seen on the east bank of the Blue Nile, about 13 m. above Khartoum, at Soba, at Ceteina, on the White Nile, and at Wad-el-Hadad, some miles north of Sennar, on the Blue Nile.
Between the Nile at Wadi Halfa and the Red sea are the re mains of towns inhabited by the ancient miners who worked the district. The most striking of these towns is Deraheib (Castle Beautiful), so named from the picturesque situation of the castle, a large square building with pointed arches. The walls of some 500 houses still stand.
by Count Gli'ichen (2 vols., London, 1905). For administration, finance and trade: The annual Reports on Egypt and the Sudan since 18g8, the annual Reports of the Central Economic Board, Sudan Government, the Sudan Gazette, and the annual Sudan Almanac. For From the Earliest Time to the Egyptian Conquest.— The southern regions of the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan are without recorded history until the era of the Egyptian conquest in the 19th century. In the northern regions, known as Ethiopia or Nubia, Egyptian influence made itself felt as early as the Old Empire. In process of time powerful States grew up with capitals at Napata and Meroe (see ante sec. Archaeology and ETHIOPIA and EGYPT). The Nubians—that is the dwellers in the Nile valley between Egypt and Abyssinia—did not embrace Christianity until the 6th century, considerably later than their Abyssinian neighbours. The Arab invasion of north Africa in the 7th century, which turned Egypt into a Mohammedan country, had not the same effect in Nubia, the Muslims, though they frequently raided the country, being unable to hold it. On the ruins of the ancient Ethiopian States arose the Christian kingdoms of Dongola and Aloa, with capitals at Dongola and Soba (corresponding roughly to Napata and Meroe). These kingdoms continued to exist until the middle of the 14th century or later (see DONGOLA). Meanwhile Arabs of the Beni Omayya tribe, under pressure from the Beni Abbas, had begun to cross the Red sea as early as the 8th century and to settle in the district around Sennar on the Blue Nile, a region which probably marked the southern limits of the kingdom of Aloa. The Omayya, who during the following centuries were rein forced by further immigrants from Arabia, intermarried with the negroid races, and gradually Arab influence became predominant and Islam the nominal faith of all the inhabitants of Sennar. In this way a barrier was erected between the Christians of Nubia and those of Abyssinia. By the 15th century the Arabized negro races of the Blue Nile had grown into a powerful nation known as the Funj, and during that century they extended their con quests north to the borders of Egypt. The kingdom of Dongola had already been reduced to a condition of anarchy by Muslim invasions from the north. Christianity was still professed by some of the Nubians as late as the 16th century, but the whole Sudan north of the lands of the pagan negroes (roughly 12° N.) was then under Muslim sway. At that time the sultans of Darfur (q.v.) in the west, and the sultans or kings of Sennar (the Funj rulers) in the east, were the most powerful of the Mohammedan potentates.